Cindy Leong is a Tāmaki-based painter whose practice probes abstraction as a medium for meditation. Driven by Eastern philosophy, the works cultivate a quality of stillness, inviting a quiet contemplation whereby time is paused for a moment of equanimity – enticing a reflection of the self and the surrounding forces of our environments that sit in tension and harmony with one another. For Leong, her artmaking process is just as meditative as she intends the works to be received. 

Her solo exhibition, A Moment’s Interlude, opens tonight at Public Record. Each work taking the form of a diptych, Leong applies muted, monochromatic colours drawn from nature, combining oil with incense ash on linen to build these textural paintings. Her mark-making moves across the canvas unrestrained in tension with the grid that holds the structure of their form. 

Ahead of the exhibition’s opening, Sofia had a kōrero with Cindy Leong about A Moment’s Interlude and her overall practice.